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A Genealogical History of SocietySociety as Economic Structure

A Genealogical History of Society: Society as Economic Structure [From the 1830s on, the frustration of expectations expanded to encompass economic liberalism, as the liberal regime also appeared to be incapable of fulfilling the predicted egalitarian socioeconomic order. The persistence of pauperism was taken to be the main evidence of that failure. As a consequence, some liberals began to critically scrutinize the economic theory of liberalism, as codified by the classical political economy, and to advocate the need to reform the economic regime of free competition. In the course of this process, however, some critics went a step further, denying liberal economic theory of any scientific value and redefining the nature of the economic activity. According to them, the economic sphere was, contrary to the idealist individualist view, an autonomous and self-regulated domain beyond conscious human control. Such a realm constituted an objective structure governed by its own laws and with the power to causally determine people’s subjectivity and behaviour, and social organization as a whole. This second variant of the modern concept of society as economic structure was finally formulated by the so-called historical materialism, embodied in the work of Marx and Engels.] http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png

A Genealogical History of SocietySociety as Economic Structure

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References (5)

Publisher
Springer International Publishing
Copyright
© The Author(s) 2018
ISBN
978-3-319-70436-4
Pages
59 –82
DOI
10.1007/978-3-319-70437-1_3
Publisher site
See Chapter on Publisher Site

Abstract

[From the 1830s on, the frustration of expectations expanded to encompass economic liberalism, as the liberal regime also appeared to be incapable of fulfilling the predicted egalitarian socioeconomic order. The persistence of pauperism was taken to be the main evidence of that failure. As a consequence, some liberals began to critically scrutinize the economic theory of liberalism, as codified by the classical political economy, and to advocate the need to reform the economic regime of free competition. In the course of this process, however, some critics went a step further, denying liberal economic theory of any scientific value and redefining the nature of the economic activity. According to them, the economic sphere was, contrary to the idealist individualist view, an autonomous and self-regulated domain beyond conscious human control. Such a realm constituted an objective structure governed by its own laws and with the power to causally determine people’s subjectivity and behaviour, and social organization as a whole. This second variant of the modern concept of society as economic structure was finally formulated by the so-called historical materialism, embodied in the work of Marx and Engels.]

Published: Oct 28, 2017

Keywords: Social structure; Historical materialism; Economic structure; Marx; Engels; Marxism; Utopian liberalism; Pauperism; Anti-idealism

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